Embodiments of the present invention relate to power operations with respect to processors, and more specifically, to temperature-aware voltage management for a power supplied to the processor.
Computer systems include processors and/or microprocessors that require different levels of power during operation, based on temperature conditions, workload requirements, etc. A voltage regulator supplies a voltage across a circuit to provide power to the processor. The voltage level of the voltage regulator is generally set to a fixed level during a testing phase of the processor so that the processor is provided with enough voltage in order to operate under worst-case conditions, i.e., high temperature, maximum workload, high clock frequency, etc., including an extra voltage as a margin of safety. However, a processor under normal operating conditions rarely encounters such worst-case conditions and therefore does not need voltage at the level established at the voltage regulator during the testing phase. Therefore, during normal operation of the processor, the voltage settings provided by voltage regulators ends up using more power than is necessary for proper operation of the processor.